Sorry, I should have added an explanation, because these graphs are typical of the regular graphs used in the project, but not self-explanatory to the unfamiliar. The pastel colour is the state of play at the start of the event, the darker colours are what we have added during the event. So for Spain, all the hoverflies have a life stage annotation (the orange bar is the same height as the green bar - which is just the total number of hoverfly observations), but not every hoverfly has a sex annotation at present.
Oh thatās great, thank you for taking the time to explain!
@calvertm has been putting a lot of effort into annotating Lepidoptera, which Iām sure you can imagine is a valiant, but never-ending effort. This is the link filtering Lepidoptera observations needing a life stage annotation: https://www.inaturalist.org/observations/identify?quality_grade=needs_id%2Cresearch&order_by=random&taxon_id=47157&without_term_id=1
4 Likes
I annotate caterpillars as I ID Unknowns - keyboard shortcuts in Identify Modal
L (for Life Stage) + L (for Larva) is quick and easy.
3 Likes
Iāve also been doing a lot with lepidoptera! 
Glad Iām not alone! I use the metadata tool to quickly annotate obvious adults.
3 Likes
Thanks to anyone who helped with this. The Syrphing Europe project accounts for 45% of the worldās hoverfly observations, and we ended the weekend with 100% life stage annotation (up from 92%) and just shy of 70% sex annotation (up from 65%). In total we added just over 76 000 annotations. Great work :)
3 Likes
I really enjoyed being part of a group - I started to recognise the avatars of other annotators 
5 Likes
Hereās some fun annotation math to put things in perspective. Right now Iām tackling life stage and evidence of presence on all Research Grade genus Vanessa observations.
On iNaturalist there are currently 5,147 pages missing life stage on the Research Grade observations for the genus Vanessa. Each page shows 30 observations, which means there are:
5,147 Ć 30 = 154,410 observations
When Iām in a good rhythm I can annotate about 20 observations per minute
At that rate:
154,410 Ć· 20 = 7,720.5 minutes
Which comes out to:
128.7 hours or 5 days, 8 hours, 41 minutes if I annotated nonstop
More realistically if I worked on it for 2 hours per day, that would be:
128.7 hours Ć· 2 hours/day = about 64 days to finish annotating this genus
6 Likes
64 days is a good target - I can aim at that - but - oh, so much better, if a few people join you for an easy task.
3 Likes
TBH I prefer to ID, and rarely do an annotation sweep. But I do caterpillar as I go.
1 Like
Just did a bunch of nymphs and exuvia. (And threw in peppering of IDs for post-emergent individuals, because hey; it was still Friday when I started.) Iāll get back to them once Iāve had some sleep. 
4 Likes
Do you use the metadata tool? Still about a minute for 30 annotations, but you can add more than one at a time.
For this reason, I really like to work on achievable projects. For example, I finished all the Spanish festoon butterflies last month. I take a screenshot of the chart at the start to motivate myself with comparing my progress :) It helps the overall lepidoptera numbers, but I donāt feel so overwhelmed
3 Likes
@nyenyedzi I donāt know what the metadata tool is, but I use the keyboard shortcuts to add annotations.
https://forum.inaturalist.org/t/announcing-the-universal-metadata-tool-beta/53182?u=nyenyedzi It works well alongside keyboard shortcuts, which I use as well.
1 Like
Thanks this looks super helpful!
Ctenophora thorax I think Ctenophora apicata and dorsalis also have variable coloration.
Males have large feathery antennae, while females have simple ones ā sex can be added too
Male:
Female:
6 Likes
thanks so much for this ! iām so happy to help :)
1 Like
Thereās a very cool tool that you might like, which it completely hidden on iNat. It is a comparison map, and to see your ornate beetle distributions go here - Comparison maps of ornate beetles
You can have all the field values on one map like so:
Or on separate maps, like so:
This is a fave tool of mine and I think itās a pity that iNat devs wonāt put in any further development.
You can put in any parameters, but you do have to know the syntax. For example, the fields syntax is
field:Ornate%20Beetle%20color=yellow
You need to use %20 in place of any spaces.
Have fun!
9 Likes
Wow. o.O 